


The Bite

by rotrude



Series: Moon Over Bourbon Street [2]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: M/M, warnings: blood play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-25
Updated: 2011-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-28 03:35:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/303287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rotrude/pseuds/rotrude
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes it's possible to circumvent death</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Bite

The skin is easily pierced, as though it's melting butter and Arthur's fangs are a hot knife. Then he's in. Before sucking, he waits a moment, bracing himself for the metallic, sweet, ambrosia-like taste of blood. And then Arthur does it, lets himself go, suckles like an infant, covering Merlin's body with his, one hand clamping down on his shoulder, the other tugging on the short strands of Merlin's hair to keep his head angled.

Meanwhile, the blood's warming him, making his head spin, making him forget all concept of time and space. He closes his eyes and lets himself fall into the sweet vortex, the warmth, the raging pleasure that spreads throughout his body; it unfurls grandly, majestically, possessing him. He tumbles into it, a feeling of vertigo overtaking him; no consciousness of self remains. All he knows is ecstasy.

In a way he's not himself; he's outside himself. He's no longer the monster from his own nightmares. He's cognisant only of a perfect state of well-being, one so strong it makes him tense. He trembles, shakes, drowns in Merlin's lifeblood, blissfully burning. He's being filled up; it's a build up, a crazy, intense build-up. He's soaring on wings made of fire.

Still flying high on the intoxicating sensation, he opens his eyes and scrambles backwards, blood running in rivulets from his own mouth. He collects himself, hands still trembling, knowing that his goal hasn't been achieved yet.

Sitting on his haunches, he sheds his coat and rolls up his sleeves. Ferally, he bites his own pulse-point, drawing blood like a vicious snake. He doesn't swallow this time; keeps the warm substance in his mouth.

He then bows over Merlin's reclining form, seeking his lips – slack and semi parted – in an unholy kiss. He pushes his tongue inside Merlin's mouth, forcing his blood inside it with the tip of his tongue, till it's pooling in Merlin's mouth and Merlin's nearly choking with it. He shares it with Merlin till there's no more in Arthur's mouth.

He uses this method again and again, letting Merlin drink Arthur's blood from Arthur's mouth. He draws back when he's satisfied that Merlin has ingested at least enough to keep him going. Praying – though he's one of the damned – that this will work, he sits back and bites his own wrist again, worrying the puncture wounds, working them open so blood's pouring from them. When he's got a steady dribbling flow, he places his wrist against Merlin's blood-smeared mouth and bids him to, “Drink, please drink.”

Merlin doesn't move; he's almost too far gone to be saved. “Please, latch on. Please, drink from me. Drink from me.”

And after a while that seems like an eternity, Merlin's subconscious survival instinct kicks in; he moves his lips, which quiver, and then he does drink. It's as earth-shattering as the inverse process.

Feeling himself being drained is like a soft descent into death that thrills him to the core, makes him go slack-jawed. He moans loudly, nearly screams with it.

“Drink,” he encourages Merlin once again. Shaking all over, nearly adrift in perfect oblivion, he gasps out,“Take it from me.”

Merlin muzzles with a little more strength. And that's when Arthur is assaulted by it, the knowledge that they're one, their blood fused and coursing through both their bodies.

The fatal kiss has done its work. Arthur has sired another like him, to be forever a part of him; neither time nor distance are ever going to change that.

Before Merlin kills him, Arthur pulls his wrist away.

Merlin's body is overrun by tremors as though he needs more, but then it subsides, and he nearly stills in a semblance of sleep. There's no heartbeat to be found any more but Arthur knows as he knows his own body that Merlin's still there – with him. Not gone.

The night-time sounds rush back to him; the world tilting back on its right axis. Arthur slides an arm under Merlin's knee, wraps the other around his shoulder and heaves, carrying Merlin away from the lonely place he died in.

Arthur's strength makes it easy and it takes him a very short amount of time to take Merlin away from the dark lane and to his hiding place, an empty shell of an attic on the top floor of an old warehouse that was abandoned long ago.

It's not a place fit for the living – but then Arthur doesn't need any of the niceties of modern residences. The unpolished wooden floorboards are rotten and half loose, part of the south-facing wall has crumbled and the little back room room gives onto a sheer drop. If you were to lean over, you'd fall into the turbulent Thames waters.

Crows and owls are roosting in the rafters, the walls are mouldy and there's not much furniture to speak of. What's there is a few pieces that he's lifted from the vacated offices on the first floor. A table; two rickety chairs; a bed; it's all he has.

Given his nature he needn't have a bed, but it reminds him of times past, when he needed rest and the solace and comfort of sleep. Now when he needs some down time he just closes his eyes and loses consciousness. For that any place is more than suitable. At the end of the day the bed is the only sentimental gesture he's allowed himself, a relic of his humanity.

Carefully, he lays Merlin on it, on top of the white sheets, though he's still covered in blood and it's already washing the linens red.

Merlin is in a state of transition; Arthur's blood turning him little by little. He's cold and pale, paler then he'd been when alive. There are dark circles under his eyes, as if he hasn't slept in centuries, as if his body has succumbed. But he isn't dead although he'll never be alive again. His skin is soft when Arthur reaches out to sweep his hair back again; his lips, red like a May rose are just as soft.

Jerkily, Arthur draws back, allowing himself time to think. First and foremost he needs to close the door, immure them, because dawn is closing in upon them. All creatures of the night shun the sun, for it consumes them.

When he's shut and bolted the door to the outer room, Arthur lets himself slide down the wall, enervated.

He pulls his knees towards his chest, hugs them and rests his head on top of them. He lets his eyelids droop closed and starts sobbing. He's just destroyed the one thing that had kept him going.

Now he can only wait.

****

The transformation of a human being into a creature of the night is slow. The process can take hours; sometimes days. The body morphs, developing new traits. It becomes stronger, faster, nearly unbreakable. A creature's sight is a hundred times finer than a human being's, so is its hearing. Its sense of smell is heightened. Decay and decomposition are staved off although death isn't. The texture of the skin changes, becoming paler, translucent. It's not exactly fragile but sunlight burns it to ashes. The light of day is annihilation to them. And then there's the thirst for blood. It's powerful, all pervasive. It's an instinct that can be fought but not dominated. It's nourishment and addiction rolled into one. It can never be quenched. The _hunger_ is physical pain, a subtle torture that never lets go till the thirst is slacked.

Arthur remembers his first days as a creature, remembers walking in a haze of need, the thirst he couldn't check. He remembers not wanting to go on like that, having no control over who he was, his actions and his needs. Being controlled by this new alien side had led him to near madness.

He'd drunk human blood then, losing his humanity. He wasn't sure whether he'd killed his victim or whether he'd been able to pull back in time. All he'd known from then on was that he needed to get 'himself' back, to fight to cling to the shreds of the man he'd been.

Now it's Merlin's turn to go through all that. But something is amiss. After having given in to anguish, Arthur walks slowly to his bed, where Merlin lies still, and sits by his side. He's ready to wait it all out so he can act as a guide to Merlin. Merlin will be scared and possibly feral when he wakes up. Arthur has to teach him how to survive.

And yet that moment seems to be far off, for Merlin's body appears to be fighting the blood coursing through him, the blood changing him. Merlin's been turned and yet he hasn't. His brow's on fire though it shouldn't and couldn't possibly be; he's sweating, another anomaly, convulsing at times, rejecting the transformation.

It's painful to watch. A body racked in agony, writhing, a mind raving. At one point – Arthur doesn't know when this might have taken place because he's lost all consciousness of time – Merlin's body arches off the bed so that only his head, shoulders and feet are touching the mattress.

Arthur has never been a decent nurse, even before he parted ways with his humanity, but he needs to do something, so he reaches out, tries to get Merlin to quiet down. If he'd known how, he'd have tried to soothe him. He talks to him and talks to him instead, trying to lead Merlin out of the maze; he thinks it might be working but then Merlin's eyes snap open and they gleam an odd yellow.

And that – that's not normal, not even for creatures like him. The molten gold has taken over the iris; the pupil's dilated. This is something Arthur has no knowledge of; but an instinct, as primal as the survival one, tells him that whatever has Merlin's eyes glowing is what's fighting the change, causing Merlin to suffer.

It lasts two whole days, maybe more, till Arthur's weak because he hasn't fed in a while. It lasts for so long Arthur feels like a prisoner of his dirty lair. It lasts so long Arthur starts to believe he's failed; that somehow, somewhere, something went wrong, and he's just killed Merlin more slowly instead of letting him slip into death quickly.

He paces. He pauses. Paces again. He kneels by the bed and timidly closes his hand around Merlin's.

He hears his own raspy voice saying, “Forgive me.”

He'd say more; he has no pride left. But he's always fought, always. Once upon a time it had been for his family, country and ideals. Today it's going to be for Merlin.

After three days caged on his own turf, he decides it's time to take action. Before Merlin starves.

 

****

He waits for night to fall and then, donning his cloak and a pair of gloves, he goes out, hunting for her. Any other creature hiding from him would be impossible to find, but she's a different story. He has to roam the city before he can actually catch a whiff of her, but when he does, he homes in on her easily.

She's mingling with humans; as she always does.

The opera house is grand, a gilded rococo construction decorated in crimson and bronze. It's illuminated by garish artificial lighting in the form of wrought wall sconces, candelabra and crystal chandeliers manufactured in other climes, under different skies.

Their glow makes everyone look unreal; the dazzling, fashionable audience filling the seats and boxes looks like an assembly of beautified dolls, put there by the invisible hand of a secret architect, an all powerful puppet-master.

The house is fully packed tonight because the actors on stage are quite popular. Sitting in a box reserved specifically for her, looking through her lozenge glasses at the performance of Don Juan on the stage below, Morgause looks regal and beautiful.

Her dress is made of rich, red velvet. It's cinched at the waist by a black satin belt, her gloves are as white as snow while her lips are as red as the blood she daily spills. The soft blond curls falling over her temples make her look like a cold, haughty angel.

Arthur slips behind her, his footfall unheard by any other person in the box. She knows he's there; there can be no doubt as to that, but she doesn't turn till the last emphatic line is delivered by the main performer.

Then she rises, putting away her lozenge glasses, her program left behind. She's out of the box and on the steps leading to the foyer before he can grab her.

“You've turned someone,” she says without preamble. “I felt it. You said you never would.”

“I promised I'd never do to someone else what you did to me,” he snaps. “But I had to.”

“Because they're special, or more worthy? Because you love them?” she asks harshly. “I knew you'd do it.”

“He didn't deserve to die!”

“So much cant,” Morgause observes coldly. “There's no such thing as deserving death; only dying. You preserved someone from death as I predicted you would. You went against the laws of nature even though you swore you never would again.”

Arthur has no time for this. “It's not taking,” he says. “It's not working.”

Morgause tilts her head sideways like a curious bird, thin lips pursed. “That's not possible,” she scoffs. “You either killed him by taking too much or he's one of us. There's no middle way. No compromise possible.”

“I sired him,” Arthur says. “I can feel him as I can feel you and you can feel me.”

“Then he was turned.”

“He can't wake. He's just lying there. Fighting it. Fighting my blood.”

Morgause is looking at him with renewed interest. “Tell me more.”

“He's in some kind of stupor, torpor. His skin burns and you know how absurd that is.” He runs a hand through his hair, trying to summon the right words to define what's been happening to Merlin. “His eyes are glowing gold. Like a panther's.”

Morgause squints at him. Her expression changes. It's nothing much but Arthur knows her well enough to suspect that she's divined something and she's not sharing it.

“What?” he barks.

“There might be nothing you can do,” she says, turning to return to her box.

He grabs her elbow, hoping there's no usher around to witness this scene. “You can't say something like that and walk away. I've come to you...” He swore once that he never would: the choice not to give in to her the only one he's been proud of to date. But he needs her knowledge. “I've come to you; the least you could do is tell me.”

Morgause doesn't turn but she tenses. She's preparing to attack and subconsciously he does the same. However, she sounds suave when she says, “Oh dear, the prodigal child of darkness has returned. Should I be impressed?”

“No, but you're gaining nothing from his lingering in that condition. You're just making an enemy of me.”

Head bowed, she asks, “You think you can defy me?” The tone is very composed. Nevertheless it's chilling.

“No,” he says. “I have no reason to now. All that I had left is now lost. But you owe me for what you did to me.”

“An eye for an eye.”

“I had nothing to do with your quarrel with my father.”

She pats her lips with her folded fan. “No, you didn't.” She pauses for a moment then goes on, “His eyes glowed gold, you say?”

“Yes,” he confirms, looming behind her to remind her of his fury, of how dangerous he could still be despite the advantage she has on him.

“Then he has magic and the magic is fighting your blood. It's trying to save him from damnation.”

At first Arthur staggers under the weight of the single word, 'magic.' He's never believed in it. Always thought it a rumour, a legend. And yet he himself is a creature most would believe fantastical. “Can it?” Arthur gulps. “Can it save him?”

“From dying?” Morgause asks. “No. Only the mythical Cup of Life could restore him -- any of us -- to life, and immortal life at that, a never-ending cycle free of the taint of the curse. But that's a fable. His magic is interfering with your venom. Fighting against him, setting him on fire, draining him. It'll kill him just as surely as any weapon can kill a mortal.”

Arthur hears the crack in his voice when he says, “So I did no good? I just gave him a few more days to be tortured in.”

“Not necessarily,” says Morgause turning around. She gives him one assessing glance. “There's a flower. It's a remedy against certain kinds of poison but it can also restrain magic.”

“Restrain it?”

Morgause dips her head as if to stress her words. “Indeed. It can't suppress it. But if your 'friend' is lucky enough, it could bridle it long enough for your venom to act, completing the transformation. Once the process is over with, he'll be just like you. Almost.”

Arthur is ready to ask more questions, but she places her hand on his arm to prevent him. “That's pure theory. It's never been done before. Or if such a thing was accomplished, it was so long ago no one remembers, not even the immortals. What kind of hybrid he'd be... That's to be pondered as well.”

“What flower?” Arthur presses. “Where can I find it?”

Morgause holds her peace for long, interminable moments. She must know her behaviour isn't wise; she must know Arthur will harm her if she doesn't speak now. In the end she does, “It's called the Mortaeus flower. You can find some specimens in a cave situated in a forest in the west the Druids of old once enchanted. It used to be called the Forest of Balor.”

Arthur is on the steps leading to the foyer before she's done talking. “...that is its ancient name. I don't know what name it bears now.”

“I'll find it.”

“You can't have long. He'll starve before you do find it.”

Arthur shakes his head, refusing to accept that. “You said 'druids'. Mordred will know. He was one. Once.”

“Why should he help you?”

“Morgana,” Arthur says. “I'll help him find your other victim. After all, he let himself be turned to be with her.”

“Arthur!”

“As you said,” Arthur says, looking at her as she hovers with her hand on the banister, “I'm rather pressed for time.”

****

Finding Mordred is easy. Finding one's nemesis always is. Arthur lets his whereabouts be known and Mordred finds him so as to kill him, a glinting silver sword hidden in his cane.

“I wouldn't do it,” Arthur tells the man blocking the path leading to Mitre Square. It's close to the place where Merlin died, which seems to be fitting. “Or you might never find out where my sister is.”

“Why would you tell me after all these years?”

“Because I need something in return and she can look after herself.”

The laugh that echoes and ricochets throughout the narrow, empty lane nearly makes Arthur recoil.

“You wish to play me.”

Arthur takes a step closer to his enemy, baring his fangs. “Not at all. I have no reason to.”

“And what is it that you would seek?”

Arthur attempts to focus on anything but his rage at Mordred and the panic the thought of Merlin wasting away engenders. “The location of a certain place.”

“A location?”

Arthur cocks his head to signify assent. “Yes,” he says. “You were once a druid. You know where the Mortaeus flower is to be found.”

“Of what use can it possibly be to you?”

Arthur and Mordred go a long way back. This means that Arthur is aware that there's little that will move Mordred to collaborate. Little but the truth itself. “There is someone... Had he been born centuries ago, he might have been like you, a druid. Instead, as it happens, he has magic. I turned him.”

There's a strange beastly glint in Mordred's eyes. That must be his surprised expression. “You turned a warlock.”

“Yes.”

“You killed him!”

“No,” Arthur denies. “He lay dying. I had no choice.”

A cloud scuttles past, throwing them in darkness. Unlike any mortal, Arthur can see better this way. “Very well,” says Mordred rather reluctantly. “This shall be interesting. Even if I don't find Morgana. This person is sure to hate you by the end of it and I'll watch with pleasure.”

“The place!”

“A cave in the forest of Balor.”

Mordred and he may have come to be antagonists but they do belong to the same cursed species now. The image of a cave, lonely, remote and dangerous appears in his mind's eye. It's a spot haunted by beasts even Arthur, who's a creature of the night himself, fails to recognise.

Mordred silently shows him the way, the path, and how fraught with dangers it is. Arthur envisions it all, memorises the twists and turns that he will face on his journey. Since he's being given what he needed, a mental map of the road to the secret cave that is Merlin's salvation, Arthur repays Mordred in kind, sending him an image of Morgana's hideout.

“Are you satisfied?” Arthur asks, cutting off their mind-to-mind dialogue. It's intimate and he intensely dislikes the idea of being so close to Mordred.

“I'm half satisfied that you're not lying,” is the answer Arthur gets. Like that, Mordred's gone, vanished from sight, only the shifting air around him alerting Arthur as to any kind of movement having occurred.

Alone, Arthur lets himself take the form of a wolf. It's the only shape that can allow him to travel fast enough to cover more than thirty miles in a single day. His fur is silver and shines in the moonlight; his fangs just as sharp as those he's been cursed with in his other form. The animal instinct taking over, he howls and begins his secret journey, his life-saving mission, slinking out of the city, loping quickly till he finally scents the balmy countryside air and can run free.

The quest is harder than he'd thought. While homing in on the location is fairly easy in wolf form, the retrieving of the flower isn't. For one, he needs his human shape to accomplish the task and to turn again he needs to wait for a second nightfall since his skin would burn if he made his attempt in broad daylight. As a barely rational creature, as a wolf, he can still enjoy the sun's rays, but it's a tactile memory, a sense of warmth that never stays when he reverts to his man-shape.

The following night, as soon as the moon appears on the horizon, he allows himself to shape-shift and enter the cave. At first it looks just like any such place would, dark and forbidding, but not overly dangerous, but then Arthur has to fight against creatures he would otherwise have doubted the existence of, giant spiders known science would have thought of as a hallucinations, and he realises that he's in peril. His strength and speed allow him to make a grab for the fragile little flower sprouting from a rocky wall, but if he'd been mortal he'd never have made it.

He's always cursed his status as a monster, but now he's almost thankful for it.

He has the means to save Merlin from doom of a kind no creature in heaven or hell knows the bounds of.

 

****

He brews a potion from the flower's crushed petals. Not being magic himself, he can't use magic in order to prepare it, but he has the drive and the desperation needed to try anything. He hopes the concoction will cure Merlin, but he can't be certain. Hesitant, he brings a cup to Merlin's lips and tips it against Merlin's mouth, pinching his nose and massaging his throat to make him swallow.

Potion administered, hours pass. Arthur can't gauge the effects it has wrought on Merlin. If anything, Merlin seems to be worse off, sweating, moaning, making pained noises. Arthur wrings his hands, paces, punches the wall, thus making a hole in it, but he's powerless to interfere with the workings of the potion.

The worst moment comes some time short of the new dawn; Merlin seizes, screams, his eyes snap open, a golden colour swirling around the iris, and then he falls back limply.

Arthur dashes to the bed, touches the side of Merlin's neck and his touch seems to prompt Merlin to finally open his eyes, eyes that are as blue and deep as they were when Merlin was alive, a barkeep with no fear of what tomorrow might bring. He's shaky and feeble as if he's come back from far, far away.

Arthur has no idea of where Merlin's magic took him.

“What happened?” Merlin asks in a husky, wrecked voice. His stare is a little vacant and Arthur understands that Merlin hasn't recollected anything yet. To this day Arthur himself doesn't remember the moment he died; he remembers the pain of her sharp teeth sinking into him, her hands clutching at his side, an impossible vice, and then darkness, nothing more than silence and loneliness.

There's no way he can break this to Merlin gently. There's no way he can make him aware without upsetting him. But it must be done. As new as Merlin is, the world outside is fraught with dangers.

“You died.”

Merlin laughs. It's not the laugh Arthur's used to. There's an undercurrent to it as though deep down Merlin knows Arthur isn't lying to him.

“I'm talking to you, aren't I?”

He lifts a hand and reaches out to touch the bared skin of Arthur's forearm. To make the potion Arthur had rolled up his sleeves, and now the contact makes Arthur burn.

Before Arthur turned Merlin, Arthur had been stunned by Merlin and had found himself wanting to see him again and again, to cherish his smiles. He had wished to know more of him: both an insatiable curiosity and a strange thirst for Merlin making him persist when he shouldn't have. Now, all that is still there but there's an added element to the mix. It's a little as though Merlin's a part of him that is outside of him, something Arthur longs for, something he needs to be complete, whole. It sends him reeling.

“Merlin,” is the only thing Arthur says. He shows Merlin the truth by way of baring his fangs to him.

Merlin snatches his hand away and Arthur makes his teeth retract.

“That's a joke, right?”

“Merlin, you were dying,” Arthur says calmly, though Merlin flinching away from him hurts deeply. “A man... he stabbed you.”

Merlin passes a hand over his stomach. Arthur undressed him and threw away the shirt he'd been shrouded in when he was attacked. “I'm whole,” he says. “I feel okay. How can I have died? You must be out of your mind.”

 _Feel me._

Merlin's eyes go wide when Arthur sends him! . He scoots back and away from him till he bumps into the headboard and has nowhere left to go.

“What was--”

“Has it ever happened to you before?” Arthur asks, knowing full well Merlin has never experienced something like that before. “Have you ever heard someone speak in your mind?”

“Madmen do hear things...” Merlin strives for simplicity. It's a rational answer but Arthur needs to counter that. Merlin can't continue in blessed ignorance. He needs to feed; needs to be taught how to do that discreetly.

“They hear voices all the time.”

 _You hunger. You thirst._

“I feel weak,” Merlin admits. “I want to go home now.”

“You can't,” says Arthur. “It's morning. It'll destroy you.”

Merlin laughs again, passing a hand through his hair and shaking his head. “That's absurd.”

This time Arthur gets angry. A few minutes bathed in sunlight are going to burn Merlin raw. A little longer and Merlin will be torn apart and more, he'll die in unspeakable agony. When he was freshly made, sleeping in barns and fleeing from his creator, Arthur was surprised by errant sun rays one morning. Nothing, nothing had ever hurt as much. As an army man – before everything had taken place – he'd been wounded and had suffered. Nothing has ever compared to being touched by sunbeams. He screamed then as he hadn't under the hands of a military surgeon.

“Try and die,” Arthur says.

Merlin gets up from the bed and strides toward the door, determined, focused, unwilling to listen.

With clumsy fingers, he unbolts the door and makes it to the short corridor leading to the side room.

The sun must be bathing everything in its forbidden glow by now.

Resolutely, Arthur is on him in a second.

It burns. It burns. It burns.

It brings tears of agony to his eyes.

He's burning, but though he can barely see anything, he manages to wrest Merlin back inside and bolt the door.

The skin of his forearms and neck is blistered, eaten raw and swollen; nevertheless he forces the door shut, skin hissing, slamming Merlin against it with all the strength he's got left.

“Never do that again,” Arthur bellows, taking in the damage Merlin's inflicted on himself in his stubbornness. It's nothing that won't heal but it's definite proof that Merlin might have been annihilated. “Never, ever...”

His fingers are digging into Merlin's shoulder; he's pinning him down forcibly, shaking him like a rag doll. He feels a furious rage overcome him; it's hot despair mixed with fear. To be sure, he's never been in such an emotional state before.

Then Merlin starts crying. It's a wretched species of sobbing accompanied by tears. It's terrible to behold.

Arthur lets him; lets his own fury subside, though he's quivering himself.

“I'm dead?”

“No.”

“But I'm not--”

“Not alive either, no.”

Arthur moves his thumb across Merlin's cheek, gentle as he's never been.

Merlin gulps, swallowing tears. “What am I then?”

“You know the answer,” Arthur tells him. Different traditions give them different names; legends embellish the facts. The truth is that they belong to the night; they are neither dead nor alive. Popular lore has made of them a lot of things but some truths have made it into common knowledge, even though branded as fantasy. They've become horror tales to scare children and the gullible on chilly nights.

“Do I have to kill? Do I have to kill to live?” Merlin has tilted his head back and has closed his eyes as if to shut out the world.

“I don't. I don't kill. I did when I was newly turned. Never again.” The hunger back then had been unbearable; the beast inside him too powerful and savage to harness.

Merlin opens his eyes; there's some sliver of hope in them. “How do you?”

“Feed?”

Merlin nods.

“Animals,” he says, then breathes in sharply. He owns up to the disgusting rest. “Fresh corpses. They must be...” 'just dead', he wants to say. But can't bring himself to do so in the face of Merlin's shock and disgust.

“I'll never do that.”

Arthur shakes him again. He's nearly lost him thrice in the space of a few days; he won't stand by and wait for it to happen again. “You'll starve. You're starving already. I can sense it. Sense you.”

“I'm sorry,” Merlin tells him and it sounds like a final decision.

Arthur can't have that; can't have him give up just like that. He empathises; he gets it. If he has to think about it for more than a split second he recoils at himself, at what he's had to do to continue existing, but there's no other choice. One look at Merlin's desperate eyes, though, tells him all he need know. Merlin isn't ready for that particular act. He can probably recall his humanity all too perfectly for him to act as though certain necessities weren't horrible.  
“You can drink from me.”

“What?”

Arthur lets go of Merlin, undoes the top buttons of his shirt, his cravat and the wing-tip collar underneath it in order to expose his neck. “I've fed. I'm strong. Drink from me.”

Merlin studies him, almost gawking. Arthur can feel from a mile off how hungry he is; five days and he's had no nourishment. Had he been human he'd be at death's door.

To lure him, Arthur tilts his head sideways, so that the tendons and veins in his neck can show. He hopes instinct can take over for Merlin now.

Merlin, however, still hesitates, trembling from head to foot.

“You won't hurt me.”

“Can I-- C-- Can I kill you?”

“Not so easily,” Arthur answers, grabbing Merlin by the neck and pushing his mouth against his own neck. “Let go,” he says. “Think of your anger. Let go and bite me.”

Merlin is now bunching up the material of Arthur's shirt at shoulder height, fingers opening and closing in little spasms. He's running his lips the length of Arthur's neck; it's more of a caress than anything else although they both shake with it. Arthur's hand in Merlin's hair directs his movements. “Feed, damn you.”

Arthur feels Merlin's lips quirking in a slight smile; “I'm already damned apparently, thank you,” he says. And then he bites; latches on.

Since Merlin doesn't know how to feed yet, it's painful, fangs slicing and tearing rather than puncturing, blood running down in strong rivulets from the wound Merlin's just created. But Merlin's drinking, Adam's apple bobbing up and down with the motion, and Arthur can sense Merlin's ecstasy at finally getting nourishment as though it's his own.

It hurts so much, as though a predator is having a go at him – but then that's what they are – till he goes light-headed and it stops being so painful.

Meanwhile, Merlin's sucking starts giving him shivers of pleasure, like climbing a high of pure, undiluted giddiness. His body is thrumming in bliss, fire and lust. He keeps his fingers tangled in Merlin's hair and grunts his pleasure out loud. Feels it as his blood ebbs out of him to fill Merlin; knows Merlin's joy and fear. It's blinding, blinding, blinding. He shouts and stops Merlin before it's too much, before he can have it all.

At first Arthur has to wrest him off to make it stop; has to untangle them, but a few moments later, Merlin is left gaping slack jawed at the bite mark he left, at the blood staining Arthur's neck. His fingers run tentatively to his own mouth and come away dipped in red. A look of horror descends upon him and Arthur can think of only one thing. He guides Merlin's mouth to his, pushes his tongue into Merlin's and laps and licks his way inside, chasing the taste of his own blood, kissing Merlin sensually while he's at it.

The kiss is open-mouthed and carnal, tongues rolling and caressing each other wetly. Frantic now, Arthur's hands rove over Merlin's bare chest, glide down to his sides, explore his back.

Breaking free of their kiss, Arthur backs Merlin up against the door once more, mouth latching onto Merlin's throat, running his teeth along the jugular.

Next he drags his tongue along the tendon.

Merlin moans out loud at that.

Arthur kisses Merlin's throat, runs his tongue slowly, hotly down his neck to his find a path to his collarbone. Then he's trailing his lips upwards again, licking the side of his neck. It's instinctive, primordial.

Only after he's been lost in it for a long while, does he remember to pay attention to other body parts, mouth going to Merlin's chest and nipples, his tongue swirling around them in odd patterns.

Merlin surges against him, pushing Arthur's head where he wants it.

Famished, Merlin's unique smell in his nostrils, Arthur puts his hands on Merlin's flat stomach, and slides them down. The movement is quick, brisk, but he savours the texture of the newly unblemished skin on his route, every small quiver, tests each reaction.

Gauging sensations is easier for the creature inside him; he can detect any little breathing pattern alteration, every blink and you miss it response, every spasm; as Merlin's sire, Arthur can feel the echo of what's going on with Merlin, his pleasure, fear, want and need. It feeds his own, doubles it, drives him nearly wild with unsated lust and desire. At the bottom of it all there's this all encompassing feeling, this need to have, cherish, possess, hold, protect, that is stronger than anything else he's ever experienced before.

He can't put it into words and likely neither can Merlin; therefore, they stay silent, let their actions speak for them. Arthur trails his hands down to Merlin's tapering waist, dances them along the waistband of his trousers.

Arthur's nails graze Merlin's flesh. Like a penitent at the altar, he kneels and kisses the skin, raining kisses along Merlin's lean belly, following the trail of dark hairs that disappear into his trousers.

He nuzzles like an animal seeking contact, breathes him in, looks up to take in Merlin's face and see how the lines of tension give way. As though he knows he's been the subject of Arthur's gaze despite having trained his eyes on the ceiling, Merlin casts a glance at him, smiling hesitantly down.

This is the Merlin from before, this quirk of lips similar in nature to the unsure but sincere little grins from he used to sport when human.

Needing the connection, Arthur pushes down Merlin's trousers so Merlin can ditch his shoes and step out of them. It's as if they were barely hanging on to him by virtue of clinging to Merlin's sharp hipbones they're peeled off so easily. Not having fed in days, Merlin has lost in body mass. Arthur promises to himself to better look after Merlin in future.

Fisting Merlin's wet, swollen, dripping cock is something that makes Merlin clench his teeth to hold in every sound he might utter.

Determined to deepen the odd link between them, the one created by blood and circumstance, Arthur strokes Merlin's cock, pulls the foreskin and stretches it beyond the head, exposing it; it's a little lighter in colour than the rest of him and for a moment it seems very nearly fragile. For a few instants Arthur holds Merlin's dick in the palm of his shaking hand, both of them trapped in some kind of silent spell.

Even as close as they now are, this is intimate beyond belief, terrifying; it sets Arthur on fire more than his blood lust has.

Eventually the bubble bursts; Arthur runs his hand along the thick vein, throbbing as it is; it's a steady, fast root-to-tip motion that gets quicker the more Merlin grunts and sobs. The noises, the earthy smell, only fuel Arthur's arousal and though he's not touched himself yet, he's as hard as Merlin is.

When Arthur wraps his lips around Merlin's pre-come-wet cock, Merlin gives one solitary little shout, a little higher than the guttural noises that he emitted before, and comes in Arthur's mouth, Arthur drinking it all in as he had his blood.

When Merlin's spent, twitching and going soft, Arthur rises and kisses him, firmly grasping his hips to keep them from jerking. The kiss becomes as deep as the ones before were; maybe this one is even more desperate than those. They still need each other, it would seem, for Merlin undoes Arthur's trousers and pushes them well past his hips. Arthur's shirt tails are still preserving his so-called modesty, but then Merlin wraps his legs around his middle and says his name.

“Arthur.”

It's the only thing he's said in a while and Arthur understands. He opens him up with his fingers, slowly, gently, Merlin's dilated eyes trained on him all the while. Merlin shifts back against the wall for support each time Arthur gives him pleasure with his touch, till he can't hold himself any longer and with carnal abandon leans his head. It moves from side to side.

“How can I be dead when I feel you?”

“I know. I know.”

They can feel pain and sorrow, sometimes joy, and even this, but the beauty that is living is precluded to them. It seems absurd – like a mockery – that they should be able to experience so much and so little.

Arthur pushes inside, buries his face in the crook of his Merlin's neck and rocks into him, needing the connection. He shuffles on his feet, his rhythms falters, his hips snap forward and Merlin emits sobs that could very well be invocations.

When he orgasms, Arthur lets his fangs out; but doesn't bite, doesn't hurt Merlin.

He slumps in Merlin's arms and keeps still, trembling, not pulling out till there's no other option.

“Come to my bed,” he says at last. “Come to my bed.”

****  
Contrary to most people's beliefs, creatures of the night like Arthur do sleep. It's a dreamless state, more like catatonia than the soft cradling of a dream-scape, but it serves its purposes. It's rest of a sort and it's refreshing.

However, when Arthur wakes, moon high in the sky, Merlin's not there to be found. The other side of the bed has been vacated, rumpled sheets the only sign of occupation.

Remembering Merlin's initial reaction to the truth, Arthur panics. He vaults off the bed and without covering his nakedness he starts pacing. Of course he can find him; they're so close now, Arthur is sure he can follow his trail, but that's not the point. If Merlin can't accept what he's become, he won't fight to survive. He will let himself go.

Sex isn't likely to change anything at all.

When he finds Merlin's scribbled message, he can't say he finds it surprising. It's a heart-wrenching – if the image still makes sense where he's concerned – little note that says, “I don't want to be this. I don't. I don't want to forgive you but I love you.”

Before he goes looking for Merlin, Arthur approaches Morgause once again. She's is his only frame of reference for this type of situation since he's always shunned his kind.

He finds her in a café, dressed in a demure gown that underlines her hips but shows no hint of cleavage. A cascade of golden ringlets is adorning her face. Cradling a dainty teacup in her hands, she's being courted – or holding court – by three different gentlemen.

To look at her, you wouldn't know she was biding her time before she turned them into his victims. But then again appearances are often misleading. She's a creature to be feared, a core of steel, enveloped by a cloak of gentle beauty. She's feral, hostile, her mind as sharp as her fangs, her purpose clear, her vengeance to be feared.

When he saunters up to her she greets him in the way best recommended by society, waving her adoring suitors away. “A word with an old friend,” she explains. “He's a relative of my dear sister's, you see.”

They scarper off, ready to pounce again when Morgause will let them. Arthur, for his part, sinks on a wicker chair, glares at the approaching waiter – who deviates from his course as soon as he spies the cold glint in Arthur's eye – and asks Morgause:

“Is there any way to turn one of us back into a human being?”

Morgause's laugh is cold and jarring. “Arthur, I thought we were past that.”

“Not for me. For Merlin. He's special anyway.”

Morgause puts down her cup. “I think he's already had a second lease.”

“You knew about the flower; you mentioned the Cup of Life. I need hope.”

“You need a miracle.”

“Even that.”

Morgause tinkers with the sugar bowl, running her fingertip round and round its rim. “The Cup of Life,” she says, “is a promise of eternal life and salvation to us all.”

Arthur eases his chair back.

“Before you begin this quest, I'd like to warn you once more; it's just a legend.”

“All legends have a basis in truth. We're a case in point.”

“And you're ready to run to the ends of the earth seeking a mystical object because of the conscience you should not have? Because you turned someone and he's throwing a tantrum?”

“Yes. I owe a debt of honour.”

“You want to give him scot free eternal life?”

“If I can.” He shrugs it off. “I'll fight for it.”

Not wishing to be ridiculed any longer, Arthur strides out of the café and its warmth.

*****

He finds Merlin on top of the marble dome of Saint Paul's. He's gazing at the pitch black darkness of the London night, perched like an owl on one of the parapets. He looks ruffled and not at all like a bird of prey. It also looks as if he's been contemplating something momentous for the best part of the night.

“I know you can't forgive,” Arthur tells him, startling him. Merlin turns and his eyes widen. His senses still need a lot of work if he can be surprised like that. “But give me the chance to make amends.”

“I'm angry,” Merlin says. Then more gently, “Not at you.”

Arthur could say that if he'd had any other viable choice, he wouldn't have sullied Merlin, tainted him with his own curse. But what's done is done, and if this has bought him time, then he welcomes his choice, even if Merlin regrets it, or wants his perfect, magic existence back. “We're going on a quest,” he announces.

Maybe this can give Merlin hope.

The End


End file.
